


the feelings that we hide

by heyfrenchfreudiana



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Bullying, F/M, HYDRA Husbands, HYDRA Trash Party, Homophobic Language, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Misogyny, Racism, Skinny Steve, Tumblr Prompt, Unreliable Narrator, Unresolved Romantic Tension, brock rumlow causes nothing but damage, immigrant Natasha, romanogers - Freeform, winterwitch - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-02-07
Updated: 2016-02-07
Packaged: 2018-05-18 18:03:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,911
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5937862
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/heyfrenchfreudiana/pseuds/heyfrenchfreudiana
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Three mini-fics based on tumblr prompts, all set in high school.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prompt 8: Things You Said When You Were Crying

**Author's Note:**

> un-beta'd to all in the spirit of flash fiction. livin' on the edge.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> hydra husbands, as requested by @lingua-mortua

Fucking group projects. 

The problem with group projects, as Brock Rumlow saw it, was not that one person would end up doing the work while everyone else fucked off.  If Brock gave even two fucks, that was actually a pro.  Of the four-person group he’d been forced into, one happened to be Steve Rogers.  Normally, Brock might have to threaten or manipulate a classmate into doing the work. Steve, the asthmatic skinny blond kid that sat in the front and doodled while their history teacher lectured, would have done everything just because he was nice and eager.  Maybe even begged to do it, Brock was convinced. And a Saturday afternoon wouldn’t be wasted on three other people and writing out the themes and literary devices to a book he hadn’t even read or whatever the project was. 

Fucking Natasha Romanoff though. 

She was new, a refugee from Russia or Slovenia or fuck if Brock even knew, and he hated her. She was exactly the kind of girl who sat in the back of class and said smart things that made their history teacher wet. She (the teacher) was the bad kind of liberal lesbian fresh out of college with a brand-new credential and all of these creative ideas about making kids learn life-long lessons while watching movies like _Glory_ and _Girl, Interrupted_. He had no doubts that she’d blow Romanoff right in front of the whole class for her “wonderful insights into the mental health system through Susanna’s journey” but it wasn’t like Brock couldn’t get that show for free if he wanted to. He’d been surfing pornhub on his phone since he was ten, _Christ_. Those scenes didn’t even get him going anymore.

At any rate, he’d been making fast inroads into convincing Steve to just do the whole damn thing when she’d piped up, her thick accent grating on his every nerve. 

“Hey Steve, I was kind of hoping I could count on you to type and, I’m sure I can meet up with you the night before, maybe but you know, my mom’s been sick and I’m kind of in charge at home…” 

“I guess I can just email you when I get finished,” Steve had said with a predictably worried expression. 

“That’s ridiculous,” Natasha interrupted. “We all work together. You, me, Brock, and Jack over there.”

“Right,” Steve nodded. “You can come to my house this Saturday.”

Brock scowled when she opened her mouth. He didn’t know how they did things back in the third world, but didn’t she realize she could have saved herself a weekend? He would have fought harder to shut her up except that she’d gotten him the chance to spend time, albeit in a group, with Jack Rollins. 

Brock wasn’t gay. He didn’t think he was gay.  He’d read once that jacking off to porn with two guys didn’t count as gay if there was a chick in there somewhere and any way, it wasn’t like he could judge a dude for making an honest living, shit he thought he probably would suck a guy off if it meant making as much as he was sure those pornstars made. So, he wasn’t gay. 

And small favors, because he was sure Jack wasn’t gay either. He’d seen Jack on campus but they weren’t even in the same circles.  On the one hand, you had Jack. Jack, with longish dark hair that almost covered his eyes and the sharpest cheekbones Brock had ever seen in his short life. Jack spent his lunches up in auto shop and worked after school rounding up shopping carts and helping old ladies put groceries into their PT Cruisers. Brock didn’t think Jack had a girlfriend but he didn’t look like the kind of guy who’d have a problem, not that Brock would even have reason to find out. 

Reason being that Brock had his own social life and after school activities to balance and juggle around. He’d worked his ass off all summer long to get to junior varsity and the last thing he wanted was to piss off Coach P by flitting around asking if so-and-so was single like a goddamn queer. Saying ‘no homo’ was one thing and no one cared if you joked once, but say anything enough times and people started to think you were hiding something.

Which was how he found himself sitting on a couch in Steve Rogers’ basement watching fucking _Titanic_. Consolation that Steve’s mother had baked them all oatmeal raisin cookies, Brock really had better things to do with his time then watch old movies just so that their teacher could pretend she was innovative and cool. 

He really hadn’t meant to pay any attention to the movie. He wouldn’t have looked up at all, even if a small part of him did kind of care what Jack thought, because he’d brought his phone. Until his phone died and he had no choice. On his left, Steve and Natasha, her head on his lap as they watched, seemingly riveted by what was obviously a chick flick. ( _Only Steve_ , Brock rolled his eyes, _would actually watch the movie when he had a girl that fucking close_ ). 

And on his right, Jack, also watching. At times, Brock thought (hoped?) maybe watching _him_ , but Brock didn’t dare look over to make sure. And then, before he knew it, he’d been hooked into the plot. It was a stupid, unbelievable movie about stupid people and a disaster that could have been avoided, but it somehow sucked him in. 

“Jesus fuck, are you crying?” he heard someone ask when a romantic flute solo signaled the end credits. Natasha and he didn’t have to look to see the smirk.  
Instead, Brock pretended not to hear the question, biting the flap of skin on his bottom lip. The entire meet-up was ridiculous and unnecessary.

“I think he is,” he heard Jack say and then he was consciously willing the knot in his throat to dissolve. Looking over at Jack, Brock steadied his voice. 

“Fuck you, I’m not. My eyes are just watering after three and a half hours of fucking torture is all.”

“It’s not a big deal,” Steve suggested, coming to his defense. “I can’t believe they let all of those people die.”

“Fuck you, Rogers,” Brock sniffed. “Stupid fucking movie. That guy didn’t have to die, you know. That piece of wood was fucking big enough.”

Jack clicked his tongue and winked, making Brock’s stomach flutter. “It’s not a big deal, Rumlow. Have a cookie. My sister always eats when she gets hormonal. I don’t think any of us would have suggested the Titanic if we’d have known you were on the rag.”


	2. 9: Things I said to you when you were crying.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Romanogers, as requested by Anon and all of the previous warnings apply. God I hate high school.

The summer of before Steve Rogers’ junior year, he studied Russian.

Not hardcore, because he wasn’t even sure how to go about doing that. Private lessons or a class at the city college, he figured, but why? The duolingo app on his phone was free and no one had to know to give him shit for it. He could lay in bed at night, his blankets pulled over his head and his phone’s brightness turned all the way down, and learn how to say “girl” and “boy” instead.

He didn’t even know he wanted to study Russian, until he’d sat next to the new girl in English II. Arriving about half-way through the year, it wasn’t like she said even two words to him even when he handed her a scantron or asked if she had an extra pen because he’d forgotten his. She didn’t talk but most people didn’t seem to talk to her either. She sat next to him in the back and he tried for two months to figure her out.

She wasn’t American. He caught that when he accidentally bumped into her on his way to his locker and all of the books and papers she’d had in her arms spilled onto the ground. He’d caught words, could see the irritation as she snatched up a piece of lined paper that had already been trampled on as other students made their way to the next class.

She had every reason to stand out and it fascinated him. Red hair that she sometimes wore in a long braid. Clothes that were at least two or three years past what all the other girls were wearing, in all the wrong colors. And an accent. She had every reason to be a target. As a professional target for his entire life, Steve thought he should know.

She sat behind him in English and he didn’t think even the teacher knew her name, (he certainly didn’t). She’d make a great spy, he figured.

He himself didn’t even find out her name until the end of the semester and totally by accident, as she’d happened to walk in on Brock Rumlow being a typical troll outside biology.

“Sup, homo,” he’d said, greeting Steve as obnoxiously as possible because he was surrounded by his jock buddies. Steve had rolled his eyes, not really interested in starting a conversation with Rumlow. He’d literally always been the biggest douche in school and the biggest pain in Steve’s ass. “Hey Steve, Whitehead has your mom’s nudes on his phone. Thought you might wanna know…”

Steve clenched his fists and pretended not to listen, his blood simmering at the thought of anyone even mentioning his mom. She’d been home for the past two weeks with pneumonia and he hoped Brock would feel like the piece of shit he was if he really knew.

“Steve, Steve, Steve,” he chanted, his friends pushing each other around in the background. It made Steve laugh how much the entire baseball team joked about people like Steve being gay, he doubted they could go a day without slapping each other on the ass. But Steve was scrawny and smart, his head bigger than his body and it wasn’t like he had any social standing to point that out. Not without a broken nose. Not without it getting to Coach P, and Steve had him for PE, wouldn’t put it past the old man to make him run an extra mile up the hill just because he was bored.

“Steve,” Brock repeated and then slapped his hand against the door by Steve’s ear. _Steve’s bad ear_ , not that Steve was going to give Brock the satisfaction of flinching. It reminded Steve of Bucky’s little sister, trying to get their attention by any means necessary.

“There you are!” someone called out and Brock took a step back, looking over his shoulder.

At first, Steve wasn’t sure who she was talking to, wasn’t sure exactly what was going on, until he saw the girl from English walk up and grab his arm. He met her eyes, his mouth on the floor, and then glanced quickly at Brock, who was smirking something dangerous, like he’d seen her for the first time. Like he had something she would be stupid not to want.

_Gross._

“I was looking for you!” she smiled and pulled him into a hug. He’d never seen her smile before. He couldn’t believe she was smiling for him. He thought about asking her if she was mistaking him for someone else but Brock and his pack of jocks lost interest and slinked away down the hall.

“ _Hooy_ ,” she muttered under her breath as she broke apart from him, opening her bookbag for her phone.

“What does that even mean?” Steve asked, grimacing that she’d come to his rescue like he even needed to be rescued.

“Hooy? She repeated and smiled. “Dick.”

He was suddenly anxious to hold her attention, to keep her in conversation, maybe because it was the first time he’d even ever heard her speak. And so he pressed her, asked her what language she was speaking, could she say more words in Russian? She gave him a small smile and let loose. Steve knew how to say enough words to make his ma turn red before the start of sixth period.

They sat together for the rest of the semester and he caught bits and pieces of who she was. She wrote in tall block letters and had fancy ballet music on her phone. She’d moved to the US with her dad just a few months before but she pretended not to understand him when he asked her about what Russia was like, all he got was _“cold."_ And one afternoon he picked up that she sat by herself in the quad, headphones in her ears as she thumbed through a magazine, and he realized only by accident that she never ate lunch.

_(“None of your business,” she said when he asked why she never ate, her features steely and she refused to give him any information. Steve didn’t push it, figured her home life couldn’t be any more or less fucked up than anyone else’s, though she did wordlessly take his sandwich from him. Which was how Steve brought double the sandwiches to school and still maintained his scrawny figure.)_

_(“Do you have friends?” she asked once in the beginning. He shrugged. Bucky, his closest friend, had moved away before Freshman year and they only kept in touch online. He didn’t ask her if she had friends, Rumlow had told the captain of jv cheer that she was a raging lesbian with a crush on their history teacher. Even if it wasn’t true, she’d gotten on Rumlow’s radar and no one wanted to associate with that.)_

They sat together at lunch, she sometimes her on her phone and he with a sketchbook, sometimes both studying, and sometimes talking about random things. And at the end of the school year, Steve couldn’t say he knew more or less about her except that she liked it when he brought sandwiches with strawberry jelly and that she would go off on whole tirades in Russian when she was angry.

Which was how Steve had decided to study Russian in the first place.

He studied how to say “this is a house, this is Tom” and more every night, his heart pounding when he thought of what he might tell her when he saw her in September.

_Ty moy drug_

_Ty ochen krasivaya_

He fantasized about telling her those things. That she was his friend, that she was beautiful. Not because he thought anything would come out of it. Well, maybe. He liked to imagine that she’d hug him for real and not just because she was trying to interrupt Rumlow. That she’d lace her arms around his waist and press her cheek against his chest, and if he was very lucky, she’d even let him kiss her lips when he told her how lovely she was.

He imagined those things sometimes. And sometimes other things, but then he thought maybe he’d just settle for “ _this is my house, you are my friend, the car is blue_ ”.

He looked for her on the first day back, not seeing her until after school, at the same spot where he shared his sandwiches.

The first thing he noticed was that she’d cut her hair, lightened it.

The second thing he noticed was that her green eyes, normally rimmed heavy with eyeliner, looked tired and red.

Sitting beside her, he thought about all of the phrases he’d practiced and how none of them seemed to matter.

“Why are you even sitting next to me? Didn’t you here the news?”

“What news?” his forehead creased at the wobble in her voice. Of all the girls he’d thought he’d see cry, he never thought Natasha would be one.

“I’ve been around, Steve. I haven’t even been in town all summer, but I’ve been busy. At least that’s what the girls say in the locker room.”

She’d found out by accident, by being in the bathroom when she shouldn’t have been, to overhear a couple of girls discussing how they’d heard that the Russian girl with the red hair had blown the entire baseball team and let Brock Rumlow put skittles up her…

“That doesn’t even make sense,” Steve scoffed, mentally reviewing where he could find Brock just so that he could challenge him, even if it meant getting hurt. She hadn’t done anything, and it didn’t make sense how she’d been singled out that way. He thought about the likelihood that she was targeted just because she’d sat next to him at lunch and eaten a few sandwiches and the unfairness of that made him dizzy.

She sniffed and laughed. “I guess there’s video evidence, it must be true.”

Steve thought about all of the things he’d planned to say, and how they were all meaningless in the moment because they weren’t enough. He looked over and saw a heavy tear slide down.

He wanted to tell her that she was beautiful and that she was his friend and that she was safe. That even he knew there was life after high school, that the Rumlows of the world only won when you let them.

He wanted to tell her those things but he held back, not sure if she’d hear them or pull up her defenses. So he covered her hand with his and didn’t say anything. She sighed and leaned her head against his shoulder, her body tense as she worked to pull all of the vulnerability back in, and he decided he’d handled it alright after all.


End file.
